Group Leader

Joel DREVET

Professor in Immunology

Joël R. Drevet received his Ph.D. degree in Cell Biology/Genetics & Immunology from the Université Claude Bernard (Lyon1, France) in 1989. From 1990 till 1993, Drevet spent four years at the Health Science Centre, the Faculty of Medicine, the University of Calgary (Alberta, Canada) as a Postdoctoral Fellow ...

Teaching

Job

Tutelages

Team 07: Mechanisms of mammalian post-testicular infertility

Our research focus is on mammalian male fertility. More precisely we are interested in the post-testicular aspects of the acquisition of sperm fertilizing ability in the male that roughly account for 50% of male infertility situations in mammals including human. This essentially covers the epididymal maturation and storage of spermatozoa once they have left the testis. In agreement with classical clinical situations with infertile male patients we have developed three areas of research using transgenic mouse models that mimic the human issues.

Research

One major topic is the maintenance of sperm nucleus integrity and its protection against DNA oxidative damage that are known to affect the fertilization rate, the proper development of embryo and the quality of life of the offspring because of the risk of transmission of an altered male paternal chromosomal moiety.

The second topic concerns the impact that classical metabolic and systemic disorders (such as dyslipidemia and hypercholesterolemia that are very frequent in developed countries) may have on the quality of sperm maturation and consequently on male fertility.

Finally, we also have developed mouse models that allow us to explore the very peculiar immune situation surrounding mature spermatozoa in the epididymis where tolerance towards the immune challenging spermatozoa should be maintained while a robust anti-infectious/anti-inflammatory survey should be installed. This fragile equilibrium is at stake in numerous human male infertility cases.